“This is no world. It is God Himself. In delusion we call it world.” – Swami Vivekananda.
The core philosophy of Hinduism or the vedic texts is not “God Created this Universe” in the sense of Universe being some materialistic entity created by God. Instead it is “God is this Universe”, or more accurately “This Universe is a manifestation of God” or “Universe is a part of the Supreme Consciousness”. So “God Created Universe” here means “God manifested himself in the form of this Universe”. God does not exist somewhere outside this Universe, it is omnipresent and the Universe is a part of this divinity. The term “God” here is not the general personified version of a super human being but instead is the all pervading Supreme Consciousness, the Brahman.
Mahavakyas (The Great Vedic Sanskrit contemplations) and Vedic phrases like “Ayam Atma Brahma”, “Ishavasya Midam Sarvam”, “Aham Brahmasmi”, “Brahma satyam jagan mithya”, “Tat Tvam Asi” all point to the same, that the entire Universe is a manifestation of the Supreme Brahman. There is no duality here. Which is why in Hinduism every aspect of nature, be it the trees, rivers, mountains, animals, planets, stars, moon, air, water, fire, teachers, parents, even one’s own self are all considered to be divine and worshipped. This entire universe is filled with divinity – the Brahman.
If the divinity is an ocean, then we are like the waves in that ocean. Can waves exist outside the ocean waters? It is like a Gold ring saying, I am a ring. Well, ring is its current form. In reality it is Gold. Similarly we look ourselves to be rings, bangles, chains, etc – but these forms are all temporary, the permanent truth is that we all are made up of Gold – the divinity. Just like Gold can be used to make rings, jewellery, chains etc, similarly the divine energy manifests itself as planets, humans, animals, etc and hence this Universe. At a fundamental level we all are one and the same. How can sweetness exist without a sweet source like Sugar, light exist without a source like Sun? Just like sweetness comes out of Sugar, light comes out of the Sun, so is the Universe, an aspect of the Supreme Brahman.
Take a realistic looking wooden Elephant. For a small child, it is a real elephant and there is no wood in it. For a grown up adult, it is merely wood and there is no elephant in it. But at a deeper level, there is neither the elephant, nor the wood, it is mere electrons and protons. The one who understands this fundamental truth realizes that the Universe is filled with quantum particles, the one who does not thinks it to be filled with elephants and wood.
The very term “Jagat” means, the one that is constantly changing. This world is a constantly changing world. And the only thing that is unchanging is the divinity in it.
The divine nature of this Universe is described beautifully in the Ishopanishad, or the Isha Vasya Upanishad.
Om Purnamadah Purnamidam
Purnat Purnamudachyate
Purnasya Purnamadaya
Purnameva Vashishyate
Om Shanti Shanti Shanti Heem
which means
Om, That is Completeness, This is Completeness,
From completeness, completeness comes forth.
Completeness from completeness taken away,
completeness to completeness added,
completeness alone remains.
Om. Peace! Peace! Peace!
“That” refers to the Supreme divinity. “This” refers to this Universe. The message here is that the universe comes from the supreme divinity, and the Universe comes from that Supreme divinity. And you cannot take away one from the other.
Consider this. Energy can neither be created nor destroyed, it can only change from one form to the other. This is a scientific fact. And we know that the Universe is made up of energy – energy manifesting itself as radiation, matter, anti-matter, etc. If Energy can neither be created nor destroyed, then it should have always existed, isn’t it? So what we call the creation of the universe is nothing but the manifestation of the ever existing energy in the form of this Universe. Science calls it Energy, Spirituality calls it divinity.
What be our point of reference, the truth is that something cannot be created out of nothing, it has to be an already existing thing which gets manifested into this something. So God cannot create this Universe out of nothing, Universe is filled with Energy, and Energy cannot be created says Science. So if this Energy already existed before the creation of this Universe, then it should be God itself, because only God existed before the creation of this Universe. Hence Universe is nothing but a divine manifestation.
And the Ishopanishad further confirms this by saying “Ishavasyam idam sarvam” – the entire Universe is pervaded by the Lord. In Bhagavadgita, Lord Krishna talks about the “Para” and “Apara” nature of the divine manifestation – Para refers to the Supreme nature of the divinity, and Apara refers to the materialistic manifestations like the elements of nature, intelligence, mind, ego etc.
The absolute divinity is Purna, the Completeness, and nothing can exist “outside” this Completeness. So there are no boundary lines which separate the Universe and the God. Divinity always existed, and the Universe is just a manifestation of this infinite divinity. Which is why Swami Vivekananda said
“This is no world. It is God Himself. In delusion we call it world.” – Swami Vivekananda
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Very enlightening
No Sri Sanjay. Pervasion requires Pervader and the pervaded – two different entities. They cannot be one and the same. I suggest you refer to Antaryami Brahmana of Brhdaranyaka Upanishad where sage Yajnavalkya clearly says who is antaryami and why all of us jivas and other inanimate entities “do not know” him but still he is the antaryami. That should drive home the point that Universe is God’s creation. This universe is a jada, inert entity while God is full of bliss…satyam, jnanam anatam brahma. The properties of universe and God are contradictory and hence they cannot be the same. But, since an inert entity cannot have an activity on its own and needs a chetana/conscious entity, it is God who pevades and impels the inert universe. You can even refer to Bhagawad Gita for more details.
Guru Please announce the completion of your book Alien Twist to God
Im dying here to read
And also never change the logo of this sitei.e please dont change the OM symbol
its very rare to see ancient powerful symbols in modern places like this
keep it up !!
well iam tired of appreciating all your posts so i won’t praise this
This text is pure crap. God is more intelligent than that!
Its somewhat difficult to imagine things beyond our common sense. The weird facts in science, the questions whose answers are beyond the reach of our science, the endless search for the first creator. Guess these things make our life more interesting. If humans knew the answer to everything life would become so boring. Alls good as long as more questions remain unanswered.
A good view point.. i felt…
http://www.krishna.com/personally-speaking
This is amazing logic. Yes, science says energy can neither be created nor destroyed. This Universe is made up of energy. As you rightly said, this energy should have existed before the creation of this Universe. We know that God existed before the creation of this Universe.
Logically it follows that this Universe should be a part of God then. The conclusion being this Universe is an extension or a part of God himself. Brilliant analysis! Kudos. Keep it up.
Ms. Shivani
Could you please explain how you concluded “The conclusion being this Universe is an extension or a part of God himself”?
Cheers
Mohan Suswaram
Guru
“Consider this. Energy can neither be created nor destroyed, it can only change from one form to the other. This is a scientific fact. And we know that the Universe is made up of energy – energy manifesting itself as radiation, matter, anti-matter, etc. If Energy can neither be created nor destroyed, then it should have always existed, isn’t it? So what we call the creation of the universe is nothing but the manifestation of the ever existing energy in the form of this Universe. Science calls it Energy, Spirituality calls it divinity.”Not really. Science calls it energy but Vedanta calls it “prAkriti”. If you want to call this prAkriti “divine” then it refers to the presiding deity of prAkriti which is Lakshmi and certainly not the Supreme Lord. You can refer to either Srimad Bhagawata or Svetasvatara Upanishad or you can refer to Nasadiya Sukta of Rg Veda (x.129) where the verse “darkness hidden in the darkness” unmistakably refers to the prAkriti principle and this prAkriti is nothing but the Big Bang singular particle (of the order of 10 power -43 cm) that resulted in this vast cosmos.
“the entire Universe is pervaded by the Lord.” –
Pervasion of Lord into every object in the Universe is different from Lord being Universe itself. The very term “pervasion” begs for two things – pervader and the pervaded. And pervasion means “entering a thing (obviously other than itself) to bestow on it the very being and becoming of it”. The grass is grass because Lord pervaded into it and made it “grass” as otherwise it would not have been grass at all.
Om, That is Completeness, This is Completeness – “That” refers to the Supreme divinity. “This” refers to this Universe.
This is called a “shanti mantra”. There’s no proof which says “that” refers to Supreme Divinity and “this” refers to the Universe. If you do a careful study of the Upanishad then the whole mantra refers to the “one and the same” entity and not two different entities (Lord and the Universe). The word “purnam” refers not just completeness but Ultimate Perfection, Infinite and a few other things which can be applied only to God. So the entire mantra refers to God and God alone. The seer of this mantra and upanishad does not give any hint to anybody that he is referring to a principle other than God unless we feel like extrapolating it to inject another entity there (Universe).
Though your attempt to unify cosmos with God is a bold one, it is still ridden with some inconsistencies. The unity of Lord with the Cosmos is not a simple unity of “God being the same as universe”, rather it is a case of “composite unity” of “everything other than God abiding in the God” for being what they are while God is different from everything else.
Regards
Mohan Suswaram
This is, by far, the best article on this blog of yours. The thought experiments related to the Creator and the Created has always occurred to me. The traditional argument put forth by the believer to a non-believer has been – OK, so you say you are made up of atoms, the earth came out of a star that fused from hydrogen atoms into bigger atoms. Now, tell us who made these atoms, who made these stars. To this, the non-believer says atoms are made out of protons, electrons and neutrons and the stars came out of a process called as Big Bang. He thinks that this is going to be the end of all the questions posed by the believer. But then the theist goes for the kill. So, now can you please explain to us, what Science says as to who created the Big Bang and what existed before it? The non-believer goes silent and the believer gives a triumphant smile! God caused the Big Bang. But is this the end of the argument? For some reason, the believer does not feel the need to explain who created the God. The underlying limitation is that we human beings are programmed to believe that everything created requires a Creator. We are not able to comprehend something that got created without a Creator. But this leads to an endless chain. If we are to assume that Universe was created by some supreme creator that did not require another creator, we could have as well assumed that the Universe itself got created without the need for another supreme creator. Universe is itself the supreme creator! The other religions say that “there is a God”. Hinduism is different in the sense that we say that “there is nothing else but God”!
Of all the vedic and upanishadic literature available, no other shloka has struck the chord with me as much as “Om Purnamadah Purnamidam..”. This is a beautiful convergence between modern science and ancient vedic philosophy. As significant to modern science as Democritus’s atom.
Just Fantastic….
Yes Gurudev, absolutely …. agreed.
God is in every particle. And because he is the supreme of all…he is the universe. but as in Geeta The lord himself said, he is everything, and everything is in him.
I love reading your articles, and frequently visit your website, I have added you to my YM , but you haven’t accepted it to date….
Guru
How is “Brahma satyam jagan mithya” a Vedic phrase? In which Veda/Upanishad/Purana does this verse occur?
Regards
Mohan Suswaram